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03/02/2015

1. Ensure that everyone who is supposed to deliver important assisting equipment to my mother's apartment, does. Again. For the third time. Because three's the charm and the first two times they came they got it 50% wrong. How does someone get a 4-item list 50% wrong TWICE?

2. Ensure that the people who are supposed to visit her, advise her, give her therapy, do.

✔️ Get 17 year old beloved daughter's braces removed before she does it herself with pliers.

✔️ Corale 17 year old beloved daughter's besties for a surprise birthday lunch without blowing the surprise (do-over from last-weekend's fail).

5. Refrain from shaking the shoulders of the teenagers who were mean to the beloved 17 year old daughter for her birthday. Don't give them a good talking to either. Even though I really, really want to.

6. Ensure that the equally beloved 12 year old daughter's birthday doesn't suck in comparison to the over-compensating I might be doing for the beloved 17 year old's birthday.

7. Find out why the dog is trying, unsuccessfully, to cough up his own lungs. That cough sounds bad, like pneumonia bad. That needs to be higher on the list.

✔️ Find a new vet to save the life of the dog. Try Yelp. Ugh, I know. Try Yelp anyway.

9. Try not to over medicate the dog while saving his life. Yes, there are three meds. Yes two of them are controlled substances. No, you can't take them yourself because they are for your DOG.

11. Write stern letter to Stanford Valet (AKA City Park) refuting their claim of no "damage to my car" since I do consider the theft of my Kindle and charger while visiting their Emergency Room to be damage.

12. Draft Yelp review for City Park warning potential future victims to keep their valuables secure while trying to also secure the health of their loved ones at Stanford's Emergency room.

13. Stop mourning the Kindle. It's a device, you can buy another one with all of your books restored. It will look exactly the same. Yes it will. Yes, it will. No it won't. Anyway, get over it.

14. Ditto iPhone charger. Yes, it's $30 for a damn charger and it totally sucks that you have to buy another one. Remembering to charge your phone everyday is taking up space you need for other items on this list, so get over it.

15. Get your work done. No, not this work, but your real work. Like QuickBooks and eBay and web updates! Oh my.

16. Make plans to fly to Utah to say goodbye to your grandmother, again. Accept that this is not a drill. No, it's not.

02/18/2015

My mother's recent hospital stay, for a severe allergic reaction and medication interaction, was nothing short of terrifying. She was so far from acting like herself that at times I wondered if she would ever be herself again. Things are better now, but she is still not what I would call Mom 1.0. She's more like Mom .9

Almost Mom. Not quite Mom.

The experience, though not over, has already taught me some valuable lessons about how to care for someone who cannot care for herself, a lesson I will no doubt be honing into a skill over time. My parents, my children and I, we are all of us getting older. So in no particular order, this is what I've learned so far:

1. Show up at the hospital every day. With HIPPA laws and shift changes, this is the only way you will truly know what's going on. Nurses and doctors will tell you everything they know face to face, and very little over the phone.

2. Show up at the hospital every day. It's the only way you'll be able to tell hospital staff critical information about your loved one and know that it is actually shared with the right people - because you shared it. Hospital care is a deadly game of telephone: you tell the doctor, they tell the nurse, the nurse tells the assistant and the physical therapist and so on...TODAY. Then, tomorrow, when there is a new doctor, new nurse, new assistant, new therapist, etc., they learn everything they know from the chart. So if that person is busy, or interrupted or simply scanning the chart, they might miss something important, like oxygen.

My mother needs oxygen 24/7. It's not recommended, it's not simply a good idea, it's mandatory. But several times - including today when she's been in the hospital for a week - I entered her room to find that the nurse/assistant/therapist/whathaveyou didn't know that oxygen was required and had let her fall asleep, do physical therapy or GO FOR A WALK without oxygen. And sometimes she can do this and still have reasonable vital signs, other times her pulse ox measurement plummets from 95 to 80. This can lead to hypoxia and is very dangerous.

Show up so you can play the hospital telephone game from scratch, with new players, every day.

3. Show up at the hospital every day, but don't stay there all day nor all night. Unless you have a real reason to believe she might die, you need to treat this care like a marathon, not a sprint. Being in the hospital, waiting for something to happen, is both physically tiring and emotionally draining. You need your strength to last so you can successfully take care of everyone and this includes you. Don't make yourself a prisoner of the hospital. You are free to go outside, eat non-cafeteria food and smell the proverbial roses. Which leads me to:

4. Take care of yourself. You already had a lot of responsibilities before this happened and you are probably feeling the weight of obligations left suddenly unattended while you protect her from the hospital. Eat well, sleep, go home and hug your children, dog, cat, or fish, super tight. Watch something you like on Netflix and for a good, long moment, pause to appreciate the fact that this is not happening to you, and to appreciate your good health. You are not in the hospital because you are ill, but you can make yourself ill if you insist on staying there night after night.

You are no good to anyone if you make yourself sick by over-caring for someone. As much as you feel like you have to stay with her all of the time, to make sure that everyone knows everything they should all of the time, you can't. There is usually a whiteboard in the room, use it to put your phone number and critical information like "Needs O2 24/7."

5. Trust the hospital to do the right thing. No, they aren't perfect and yes you do sometimes need to step in, to make decisions and share information and you're doing a great job of that. But you also need to realize that these caregivers are some of the smartest and most caring people you're going to find anywhere. Most of them are sincerely nice and all of them are working to make her better. Trust that they can do so.

6. Keep a diary of her symptoms and tests. After days of hospitalization, it can get hard to track what's important. If eating is an issue, log it. She's not sleeping? While that can be normal in hospitals, log that too.

7. Use the buddy system. If your sibling, like mine, lives far away, use Skype or FaceTime to include them. My sister and I did many meetings with Mom's care staff as a team. It made my sister feel less helpless, and me less alone. You may not realize it, but you need help to get through this in one piece. Accept the help that's offered and ask for it if it's not.

8. Be prepared for setbacks. People get better and then sometimes relapse. The relapse doesn't always mean they are getting worse, it just means they need more time to get better. Stay positive and strive for an even keel. This is a bumpy ride we're on and there can be ups and downs and sharp, unexpected turns.

9. Try not to read too much into any particular test result or even what happens on any given day. We're looking for trends, markers that show we're making progress in the right direction or that we're not getting anywhere. One of my mother's doctors explained the concept to me like this "Don't just do something, stand there!" The idea being that the feeling we should always be doing something, trying something to make something (anything?) happen, is ingrained into the American psyche. But the phrase "Time heals all wounds" is not just for heartbreak, it's also for being sick. And if you constantly do something (anything?), you interfere with Time As Healer. Worse, if you keep doing stuff, you may be interfering with the stuff you just did. Sometimes you just have to stand there and do nothing.

10. Be sure to keep an eye on the big picture. If her test results are better overall, don't let the fact that she is still sick take away your optimism.

11. Celebrate the little improvements.

12. There will be days when you just can't go to the hospital. Can't take another day. Need to run away or scream or have a massage or retail therapy or pound some sand. Do it.

This is hard work you're taking on. I know it feels like you're just sitting in the hospital, waiting for something to happen, waiting for the doctor to come, waiting for the nurse, waiting for lunch, waiting for her fever to drop. But it's more than that. Your butt may be in a chair, but your brain is pacing the floor. Cut yourself some slack. Yes you have to go to the hospital every day - unless you can send your sister/brother/trusted person who knows the critical information that must be shared. But you don't have to stay there. And as I said before, you are no good to anyone if you are at the end of your rope. So go for a half hour, then run away and do something that makes you happy. It's okay. She will be okay. You are not singlehandedly responsible for what happens next. She will not die because she woke up and you were not in the room. No, she won't.

And if pounding sand and all that jazz isn't enough help, find someone to talk to. This burden is too big to carry alone. If you don't have a buddy, ask the hospital for help. It doesn't mean you're crazy or failing, it means that what you're doing is hard. You need and deserve support. And since everyone else is thinking about the person in the bed, you have to make sure that you get the help you need yourself. We have a lesson in our house called "saving your own life." It means doing whatever you have to do to help yourself, instead of waiting for someone to notice you need help.

Remember that you can't do your job if you are overwrought and spent. This care you are giving, it is a good thing and you are a good person for doing it. Stop being hard on yourself because the rest of us think you are awesome. Eat something and get some sleep, you need your strength.

02/14/2015

She sits in bed and scratches her shoulder. Scratches her face. The top of her head. Her knee. Her ankle. That hard-to-reach place between her shoulder blades. Ah, that's it. Everything itches.

A nurse says "Try not to itch that." I know she's just trying to be nice, to be supportive in that higher-than-normal-dogs-can-hear-it-perfectly-I'm-talking-to-an-impaired-person voice, but all I can think is that she's using the wrong word. Itching is the symptom, scratching is the thing my mother is not supposed to do.

And if she were herself, my mother would not be able to resist correcting the nurse.

If she were herself.

But she is not herself. She is a shadow, a missing person. There she sits, scratching her itching skin, not actually present.

Where did she go?

On Monday she was fine.

On Tuesday she crashed the car.

On Wednesday she asked for help.

On Thursday she was admitted.

The doctors are mystified. Her symptoms do not add up and they are desperate for some easy math. A common denominator they can use to justify the wide array of disparate symptoms. Hives, but not hives. Caused by what, we don't know. Ameliorated only somewhat by strong doses of antihistamines. Hives that have been around for a week now. Hives that should go away but aren't. Let's call that Mystery Number 1. It's a physical mystery which everyone likes because it feels tangible. You can touch it but don't, 'cause it itches. And she will want to SCRATCH that.

My sister and I are concerned about mystery number 1, but it's not what tortures us. We know the itching is awful, but it won't last. It will go away eventually, the skin will calm, the welts will vanish, the red skin will fade to pink, then white. No, what concerns us is our mother's mind, and why it has suddenly gone AWOL.

Every time my mother wakes up she asks me where she is. She is surprised and dismayed to rediscover that she is in the hospital. How long has she been there? Three days. "No!" Yes. And then she forgets all over again. She awakes with a start and asks "where am I?"

Today she told me that she needed new clothes for the impending car ride from her hospital bed to the MRI room. We'll be taking the turnpike. She's worried that everyone in the hospital has seen these clothes already and will know they are the same ones she was wearing when she arrived at the hospital. She wants to look presentable. She wants her comb.

She's talking to dead people.

She'll start a sentence and be 100% herself. "I dreamt I was in school and I had to write a 100 page paper..." Then her voice changes, drops pitch and she'll start to mumble, unintelligibly. I wait, hoping for a return to lucidity. Sometimes she snaps to and sometimes she falls asleep, mid-sentence. Yesterday she fell asleep with a fork and knife in her hands.

Her nurses keep asking me "Is this her baseline?" This is code for "is she always this disoriented?" No she is not. Please write this down: this confusion, this short-term memory loss, this falling asleep while talking, THIS is part of the problem. This is Mystery Number 2. But the nurses aren't good at the telephone game, and I have to tell each one in turn. No she is not normally confused, she is smarter than you; she proof-reads the New York Times and finds mistakes. She could kick your ass at Scrabble.

This is what you have to fix.

You have to bring my mother back.

When she falls asleep that way, so suddenly, her eyes roll back a little and her eyelids flutter gently, in the way I remember my children doing when they were so tired that sleep literally had to overcome them. My mother has been sleeping for days and she is still so tired. She literally cannot stay awake. Even though she wants to. Not even long enough to finish a sentence.

Every time she wakes up it's Groundhog Day. "You're in the hospital, mom. You've been here since Thursday. I don't know when you can go home. Not yet."

01/05/2015

I've never been a fan of new year's resolutions. So many promises focused on health - really weight - and after a month of vigorous participation, most of us slide into sporadic attendance to be followed quickly by the familiar pattern of wishful thinking and guilt.

For many years I didn't set any resolutions, I simply welcomed the new year and hoped for the best. The past few years have been on the tough side, and I've decided to break some of my established patterns in an effort to control my destiny - at least the things that I can. Remember that episode of Seinfeld when George decided to act oppositely of every natural impulse he had? And remember how that worked out so well (mostly)? Well, that's kind of where I'm at right now.

I'm in a rut. Working all the time, but not necessarily working as smart as I could. Also, I'm not writing anymore, and I'm not exploring music the way I want to.

Part of the reason why I set my life/career in this direction was so that I could do more of the things I love and spend more time with the people I love. And while life in small business can be a series of pop quizzes, I have to acknowledge my own role in the cycle. (see definition: insanity)

For 2015 I'm making a few changes:

1. I'm going to write every day. I may not post every day, but I made a pact with my girl that we would both write for 15 minutes a day - posting at least 3 times a week. (Time: 6:51) She wants to be a journalist and I think she will benefit from more practice writing under pressure. I will benefit from getting back on the proverbial horse and trying to write a post that consists of less than 1000 words (word count: 286).

2. I going to do a better job of managing my job priorities and stop characterizing them in my head as "juggling. " I have a tendancy to focus on the fire burning closest to my body, which is not always, all urgent imagery aside, the most important thing. Related: I will stop setting fires.

3. I will be kinder to myself and to those around me by picking my words more carefully. I have been blessed with a large vocabulary, and sometimes I allow it to veer into the dramatic and/or negative. Not totally sure why that is (hmmm, could that be resolution #4?) but as I said above, I'm going to actively change "juggling" to "managing," "crazy busy" to "getting things done" etc. Words matter, as does positivity. I will also stop picking apart my writing, which has, over time, become a genuine obstacle to writing.

4. Positivity. In all things. As much as I can muster without feeling insincere nor putting on rose-colored glasses nor losing sight of what's important. I tell my youngest that happiness is a choice, that the glass is half-full. Now I'm looking in the mirror when I say that.

5. Health. I know, I know, it sounds like such a crock of shit to even put it on the list, and yet. My goal is not to get down to 140lbs, although that would be sweet. My goal is not to look good in a bathing suit or to wear tight-fitting clothes. My goal is to get outside, do a little cardio, breathe some fresh air, adjust my perspective, look for wildlife and maybe get a little fitter in the process. The Mister and I get along much better when we take a morning walk, talk about our kids, think about the day to come and strategize in general. It's good for him, it's good for me and it's on the list.

01/04/2015

Someone I know socially and thought was a friend, in part because she is with someone who is a very good friend and partly because I've known her for a long time. We were never what you would call great friends, but we were friendly and she was nice to my kids (my soft spot). And it seemed like we should be friends, because we have things in common. Friends and interests in common. That's where friendship begins, right?

Flash back to several years ago: there was a party and a friend who was upset about something that, in the big picture doesn't really matter, but over breakfast the next day was annoying and confusing to everyone. I commiserated, in a way less vocal than what one might expect from me. In a way less vocal than I might expect from myself - I am not known for my suppressed opinions. But in a disagreement between friends I felt uncomfortable and kept mostly silent.

For all the good it did.

Because this "friend," this mutual someone, gossiped about me to others, attributing remarks to me that I never said, in a way that almost completely killed my friendship with one of the parties in the temporary annoyance. What she said was 90% untrue, and it was more than a little galling that any of our mutual friends would believe me capable of such bad faith. Yet here we are, years later, and one friend is only kind of over it. Part of him believes I said terrible things about him. So much so that when he and I finally discussed The Annoyance face to face, I could see in his eyes that he didn't completely believe me, and still today there is a rift in the treasured friendship. We stopped having dinner together, coffee together. I was heartbroken. It was like losing a family member. A godfather, actually.

And so, with a few casual lies over lunch, she destroyed a friendship of over 20 years, maybe forever.

But she is with my other friend, someone sweet, without guile and deserving of unconditional love. Someone who should be appreciated and cared for and whom I love like a brother.

I should try to get over it, right? For his sake. That is what Jesus would do. What the Dalai Lama would do. What Salvador Dali would do. This is what I told myself. Over and over again. But I was operating at a net loss, and it was hard to get over.

It's one thing to have lost a friendship, it is quite another to have it stolen from you.

Eventually I was able to meet her socially without wanting to shake her by the shoulders (or punch her in the face). Eventually I mustered my inner bigger person and accepted the inevitability of her presence and moved on. I'm good at not remembering slights which is perfect for this kind of situation. I let it go, more or less. We had fewer invitations from the beloved friend she gossiped to, and that stung. But after a while one can be perceived as protesting too much. So I stopped talking about it and hoped for the best. Waited for time to heal.

Years pass, and instead of healing, she inflicts a new injury, an obvious and public slight. Invited to dinner, then univited to dinner. Two hours before dinner, after we were dressed, before we actually left. After the kids knew of our plans. After we'd discussed the dinner with friends, what we would bring, what time we would be there, etc. Nothing important, simply another dinner where we would all be together. Except not.

A simple text to announce "Rain." And not enough room for us. Sorry. "We'll see you next time."

Everyone knew, but no one knew why. I still don't know why.

Reports back from the dinner were "everyone who is always there was there, except for you. Dinner as usual."

Friends who were aware of the slight were embarrassed and uneasy, they knew that something had happened, a line had been drawn, but no one knew why. What had we done?

The best part of being me is that I almost always know when I've made someone upset and why.

But not this time.

As far I knew, I was the injured party - from that time years ago, the thing she and I never talked about and no one apologized and we all just pretended had never happened.

So what could I have done except to ignore a grievous slight?

Here's the thing: for The Annoyance, 90% of the words attributed to me were untrue - but 10% was true. I was not blameless. So part of my getting over it was accepting my responsibility and moving forward. But for this dinner, this slight, I did nothing for which I can account. And still today, months later, I can't ignore the insult and I'm not getting over it. Even though a bigger person surely would.

What would Salvadore Dali do?

I'm sure I should forgive and forget and blah blah fucking blah. Suck it up. See the big picture. Ignore the smaller person who insists on making herself smaller at every opportunity.

But no. All I can see are melting clocks.

I'm owed an apology. A real one. Not a back-handed simper "I'm sorry you feel that I slighted you in front of your children and all of your friends." Kiss kiss.

The ironic part is that the universe keeps showing me articles written by other people about how to apologize. The best is this one, and it's one that I fully intend to incorporate into our family. But not for this event, because while there may be outstanding apologies for me to give, this is not one of them.

And while I hate to think of myself as unforgiving, I'm also starting to believe that if you turn the other cheek too many times in the face of obvious treachery, you are living the definition of insanity. Complete with melting clocks and crazy mustaches.

09/21/2014

My friend Roy died last year. Only slightly older than me, we worked together at my very first, and most beloved startup, IntelliCorp. Roy was the older brother I always wanted and never got. He made me laugh and laugh and laugh, and then in the next breath he would make me so mad my ears would turn red. We shared cigarettes on the balcony and lunch in the kitchen.

After eight years and an untold number of layoffs it was finally my turn to leave the IntelliCorp nest. I was sad and afraid to leave the friends who had become family, and I had a strong, unfounded sense that I was unqualified to work anywhere else. I had done so many different jobs over the eight years, what skills did I actually possess? Part of me believed they had kept me on at the company out of love. Today I know that this is a naive way to think, but back in the day it could have been true. Startups were different then.

In any case, Roy helped me to get over those feelings. By simply being a good friend who believed in me, he helped me to believe in myself. I gathered my courage and moved on to another startup. And through the inertia of benign neglect, we lost touch.

Eventually Facebook and LinkedIn brought the IntelliCorp community together, in the virtual homeland of social media. I learned that Roy had moved to Thailand and that he had started his own company. That he was still passionate about politics and incapable of keeping his opinion to himself (a flaw we share). It felt great to have him back in my life, even if it was virtual. It felt good to be connected again.

And then, in a completely unexpected turn of events he was gone. A heart attack while riding his bike, he collapsed on a bench and never woke up.

He was 50. Healthy. Now non-smoking, bicycle riding, and fit. This was impossible.

Together the IntelliCorp family mourned the loss; quietly, in small, heartfelt posts, many with pictures. And while I was sad, I was comforted by the images that showed him to be happy and surrounded by friends. This was the virtue of Facebook I thought. Social media had brought us together to share our farflung lives - with the happy, joyful, mundane, sad and horrible moments we all experience. This was a moment to be shared with friends. It was consoling to "be" with other people who cared about him.

Then, four months later, Facebook notified me that it was Roy's birthday. I was taken aback by the wholly unexpected reminder. It was too soon.

I guess someone has to notify Facebook that a person is no longer alive before they take down his page. And I bet that's a hard thing to do if you're the family member who could do it.

Or maybe they never take it down.

Touched by the memory of Roy, I went to visit his page, to see who else missed him. Quite a few of us, it turned out. The community sentiment was wistful and sad and mirrored my own feelings.

Another shared moment.

But then I started to see something that made me uneasy: there were posts from people wishing him a happy birthday as if he was still alive. Posts from friends and colleagues who didn't know; sales pitches from people who may never have met him. All leaving these greetings and messages on his wall. It felt inappropriate and unsettling. Like the defacing of a memorial. Like someone should say something to make them stop.

Or perhaps Facebook could just stop sending out notifications to everyone in Roy's contact list.

Then, perhaps because I was overly sensitive to the idea of social media keeping Roy alive, I noticed something else: whenever I invited people to our shop events, Roy was included in the list of people I could invite. I couldn't help but think "no, I can't invite him. I can never invite him again."

Cue sound: ripped bandaid.

Today, almost a year later, Roy is still alive on Facebook. Working (present tense) for a technology company, living in Reno. Available for birthday greetings, invitations and sales calls. We share 34 friends.

10/11/2013

There are few things as mindlessly satisfying as vacuuming one's own house. The work isn't hard and you don't have to think. It doesn't take very long and the results, at least in my house, are immediately tangible. The air even smells better, thanks to my super duper hepa filter.

We have two kids and one dog and we never ask anyone to take off their shoes before coming inside the house. Mostly because we have two kids and one dog and they alone make the house unsafe for bare feet.

Most of what I vacuum is dust and dog hair. Mostly. But sometimes I marvel at the mysterious noises I hear clanging up the vacuum hose. Oh, I know. When I hear that I'm supposed to turn off the vacuum, put my hands into the vile, though terribly efficient, vacuum bag and search for the culprit. Because that stuff, the stuff that makes noise, must be important. Or even precious.

But I don't do that.

Or rather I have only ever done that once: today. When I accidently vacuumed the adapter to the headphones I almost never wear (connecting small to large, or is it large to small? I forget. Which means I'll never remember to buy another one and I might as well throw the headphones away.) That adapter clang was too big to ignore and from a highly suspicious location - the electric keyboard. Why, you might ask, would I bother vacuuming the electronic keyboard? It's because of the spiders. We have a lot of spiders living in this house and, ironically enough, a lot of arachnophobes. I'm the only one who's not afraid of them and therefore I am the designated spider killer. And I won't relocate them although I will relocate grasshoppers, moths and crickets. All spiders bite except for daddy longlegs, which is ironic because their venom is just as toxic as any other spider. But for reasons we don't understand, maybe because they're sweet or simply too lazy to bother, they rarely puncture anything harder than an ant. But I kill them too. Not because I'm mean or scared but because those things reproduce like rabbits. I vacuumed at least a dozen of them today and I know that in a week an entire set of identical replacement daddy longlegs will have shacked up in my house. The smart ones live up high, out of reach of my vacuum attachments; the dumb ones live close to the ground, which is good for finding food and bad for avoiding the vacuum.

But the fact that my house is a spider house has to be our little secret. Because if my arachnophobic family had any idea that our house was a spider house, they'd never come home again. They can't handle the truth: that every house is a spider house. Just like every bed, every eyebrow has mites. Yes they do. Oh yes they do. Try not to go crazy with the idea while you look it up and whistle a happy tune instead. Anything from The Wizard of Oz will do, especially this version with Tom and Jerry.

But back to vacuuming: I think my kids think that when I hear the jingle jangle of pointy things going up the vacuum that I'll stop and see what has happened or even open the vacuum to discover which precious thing has gone to vacuum heaven. This, as you know is not true. The truth is that I have grown to like the pitter patter of children's toys as they fly up the vacuum. Earrings from Claires. Bobby pins. Flosspicks. Things that once were glued but are no longer. Money. (Okay, I do keep an eye open for that since it officially costs more to make pennies than they are worth and I feel it's my obligation to keep them in a big jug in my garage that will eventually collapse under its own weight and take part of the house with it.) Hair clips and Barbie shoes which are officially from the devil; they hide themselves during the day and then strategically scatter themselves underfoot in the middle of the only path through the clean and dirty clothes that is your safe passage to kiss the children goodnight. Ow. If by chance I happen to spy a Barbie shoe in its daytime hidey hole, I take special care to vacuum it up. Yes. This is why all Barbie clothing sets have only one shoe. The rest of them are in vacuum hell.

You have probably done the math to realize that this is also where the socks go. When the girls were little I took great care to wash the socks, pair them and put them away in a drawer. Then they grew up and decided that matching socks were totally unnecessary, even unseemly. As were clean socks. Socks are now left to languish wherever they are left and paired randomly at the last minute, in great haste as their mother yells "I'm leaving without you!"

So if I happen to be a tiny bit distracted while vacuuming, and hear the gentle slurping sound that only a sock can make as it goes up the hose, well I have to smile a little. I understand now. I am a silent witness to a form of sock suicide: fed up with their own smelly existance, missing the mate they haven't seen since the day they came home from Target, they throw themselves at the vacuum, praying for some kind of escape. They don't know, and I can't tell them, that they've actually jumped into an alternate dimension, a smellier, dustier and darker version of our house – filled with all of the other things we no longer care to see nor step upon with our precious bare feet. But with any luck, these poor soles will finally find their long-lost mate. Those who escaped last week, to live forever, or at least until trash day, in the Vacuum Zone.

09/05/2013

At last, the moment I feared would one day come has finally arrived, albeit somewhat later than I expected. I was grateful for the delay – any delay really - because I dislike conflict with my kids. And she's so sweet and sensitive and smart; I don't want to wage battles that might crush her. And she's strong; I don't want to be crushed by her in battle. And we are entering a power shift where she has slightly more and I have slightly less. It's time to move more carefully and watch for the newly installed landmines that are a feature of Teenager v15.6.

I think the lateness of this stage encouraged me to hope that maybe this moment wouldn't come at all. That maybe we would be different. That we wouldn't have to go through what I went through with my parents. What he went through with his parents. What our parents went through with their parents. What a maroon.

It's silly to say but I thought that maybe, just maybe, I was so good at this parenting thing that we would be able to skip over the (seemingly) inevitable "I hate you" phase. Our girls would grow up, graduate, go to college, get jobs, move away – but not too far, and call us on the phone every day, loving us just as fiercely as the day we met.

Seriously, I was determined. My girl would not hate her parents.

On the one hand I know that pulling away from one's parents and rebelling is part of the process and it's important. Kids need to be able to engage in conflict in a safe space with safe authority figures so they can develop and practice skills needed for later, when the ones they will engage in conflict will be less unfailing in their affection.

On the other hand, it's soooo much nicer when we get along. When I don't have to nag about chores, healthy food, the state of the kitchen, the state of her room, etc.. When she sweetly tucks her head into the crook of my neck (my god, she is so tall) and coos "maman." This is much, much nicer.

So the tantrum, with its DefCon 2 levels of emotion, caught both him and me by surprise. And out of range of appropriate shelter, I might add.

We were in the car.

Trapped.

With a very angry teenager.

The reason she was angry is not important enough to share. It's not even a single reason. It's a virtual potpourri (emphasis on pourri) of reasons, some real, some manufactured and all thrown in to the pot for good measure. She actually yelled at us, which was impressive. Then she stopped yelling and stomped out of the car, having perhaps decided that she would create only a minor scene in front of the house (The neighbors!).

She did not back down from her father's scolding; she challenged it. Then she stormed up the stairs and shut her bedroom door with purpose –without actually slamming it. Smart. Called to dinner, she arrived but would not eat. She did not talk to us. She went to bed early and angry.

We let her, even though this is counter to our own "never go to bed when we're arguing" marriage philosophy. However, nothing we are saying was actually working, so maybe sleep would.

And it did...kind of.

She came downstairs the next morning wrapped in a blanket. She was sleepy-eyed and contrite and I gave her a big hug while waiting for the other shoe to drop. Hugs are great but I wasn't fooled, this skirmish wasn't over yet. This fury didn't come from nowhere, and one way or another we'd have to talk things through until we got to the source – even if that means going to Teenage Ground Zero (currently in beta, this level is tentatively scheduled for v16.8).

She doesn't want to talk about it anymore. She wants the whole thing to go away because she doesn't want to be mad, doesn't want me to be mad, is exhausted from the force of her emotions. But in no time the grievances start to seep out. Things I said that came across the wrong way. Perceived parental preferences that compared her – very unfairly – to her sister. Events and transgressions that seemed innocuous at the time, but which turned out to be greatly injurious to a girl who is less and less a child but not quite an adult. She had a pile of pourri to share with me.

Sincere apologies are issued on both sides. For a moment we understand each other and are back on level ground. Well, the version of level ground that has me with most of the power and her with somewhat less. Which is just how I like it. ;-)

But I can see the future, the one I'd been hoping to avoid. And I understand now, in a way I didn't before, all of the jokes about flash-freezing teenagers and thawing them out when they're 28. Just think of the money that would save.

Resistance is futile as they say, and before you know it we will battle again. And she will experiment with fighting back and hurting our feelings, not because she's mean, but because she has to see if she can do it. I only hope I can stand the auto-update version upgrades that will arrive every month until we get to Woman 1.0, when I feel certain she'll be a reasonable, strong and wonderful person. Who loves her parents again.

05/27/2013

The other passengers tried to warn me with their eyes but I didn't understand them in time. I was new. (I'm still new but I'm quickly learning the ropes.) I sat down in the nearest seat, right smack next to the crazy guy. Being that the muni train was full and I was concerned about being late, I didn't give it much thought. For about 120 seconds. Then the guy started talking to me. "Why is he driving so SLOW?" New but not stupid, I didn't answer him. I opened my book. Crazy guy turns to the captive bus population and asks them all 'WHY IS THIS GUY DRIVING SO DAMN SLOW?" Waiving his arms forward with derision, in case we didn't get the message. "HURRY UP!!! LET'S GO! MOVE IT!"

His lecture continues for the duration of the trip and the woman across the aisle looks at me as if to say "I told you so."

><(((*>

The muni train was waiting when I started down the escalator. In a panic, I flew down the stairs and ran onto the train before the doors could close. Immediately the muni staff start yelling at me and waiving their arms. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING? GET OFF! GET OFF THE TRAIN!" I look around and realize I'm the only person on the train, and jump off the train just as one of the muni people starts to reach out for my arm. "Get. Off. This. Train!"

Once on the platform I discover that they're taking the train out of service. I watch as one train after another rolls in, disgorges passengers, closes the doors and drives away. Seven times in a row, it starts to feel like a joke. The joke is on me, of course and my fellow travelers are still tittering at my mistake. Cheeks red from embarrassment, I start to fret about missing my Caltrain. Muni might show up every 10 minutes or so, but Caltrain waits for no one.

><(((*>

The Caltrain was just pulling in as I ran up the stairs. My first time using a monthly pass I remembered to tag before boarding to activate my pass. The machine beeped an unpleasant "you did it wrong" sound. I had no time for games, and after one more try I scampered onto the train to take my chances.

Except that I'm not the girl who takes these kinds of chances. As the conductor came around I presented by card in the hope that he 1) wouldn't throw me off the train and 2) could tell me why it didn't work. He had to go to the front of the train to retrieve his scanner. Ten minutes later he scanned my card and announced "you don't have any money on your account." I showed him my receipt for the monthly pass, which miraculously I still had with me. "You have Caltrain credit, but you have to leave $1.25 on your account to be eligible to use the pass." I looked at him quizzically and he shrugged his shoulders in that "I just work here" way. He didn't throw me off the train though, Caltrain staff are some of the nicest folks around.

><(((*>

Caltrains are divided into groups: 1) super fast and kinda scary and doesn't stop at my stop, 2) reasonably fast but doesn't run very often, so better not miss it, 3) very slow and 4) appallingly slow.

I take the same reasonably fast trains every day, and I get to my destination in 30 minutes unless something happens, like they hit a person or car or a something, and then it takes three hours. Twice in two weeks they hit pedestrians, one of those weeks they also hit a car. Whenever this happens all trains are stopped in both directions while they conduct an investigation, counsel the engineer and clean up the mess. It's kind of amazing that people get hit by trains during the day, the tracks positively sing as the train approaches, the whistle blows loudly and the sound of the approaching train can be deafening. Whenever the super fast kinda scary train flies by, I cover my ears and huddle into my jacket. The resulting wind blast is cold and sometimes flings objects.

><(((*>

As much as I like to support the home team, home games wreak havoc on the muni schedules. Overloaded and overtaxed the trains slow down to a literal crawl, and sometimes stop suddenly in their tracks. Always without explanation. The last time I got trapped in the mire, after a 10 minute ride had become forty, the muni train stopped at 2nd and King and announced "we'll be staying here for quite a few minutes." I looked at my watch at realized that if I didn't make a run for it I would never make my reasonably fast train and I would be forced onto the appallingly slow one. I disembarked and started running. And then I slowed down, gasping for breath, reminding myself that these are long blocks and I will never make my train if I pass out.

Running again, then skipping. A fellow muni escapee passes me on his skateboard, turning to look at me and grinning. I run again, feeling older than I've ever felt. I make the train with a minute to spare. There are no seats of course, but I'm in the baggage car and there is space on the floor, next to the escaped skateboarder. I take it. I search for my inhaler and take two hits. Air. Thank goodness.

The men standing in front of me change their position in a way that seems odd and I look down. I see that my shirt has unbuttoned during my run and an important closure is open and I've become somewhat of a spectacle. Praying that I don't end up trending on twitter, I quickly re-button my shirt, put away my inhalers and open my book. Act casual. The train packs in a few more lucky passengers, and I'm suddenly grateful for my little spot of carpet. A railing stabs me in the back all the way home and my legs keep falling asleep from their unnatural position on the floor. But I'm on the train, on my way home.

><(((*>

The light turns to darkness as we descend underground. The doors open with a whoosh and I'm thrust into the swarm of fellow travelers all streaming toward the same tiny escalator. Up up up. The smell of coffee and the queue of bleary-eyed people waiting for another dose of caffeine. Music, today it's a guitarist playing "Blackbird." Yesterday it was a violinist with a budding opera singer. Up another escalator and into the light. The street is busy with office workers, runners, homeless people and tourists. Most walk quickly but some have no idea where they are - they are looking at their phones and depending on god, luck or the kindness of strangers to keep them from getting run over. Most of the time it works out.

Once oblivious, I am now very cognisant of the messy, living network of trains and commuters under my feet. This is my city life.

04/12/2013

Although my optometrist assures me that my eyes are remarkable for a woman my age, I am starting to feel the effects of my aging eyes. The mottled blur of things that are much too close. The inexplicable shortening of my arms. The squinting.

I am told by experts that I can't actually feel my lenses thickening and I kind of wish I didn't know it was happening; my mental imagery sees formations of ice, ocular glaciers, creeping their way across my retinas.

If only the world was more beautiful as a result. I don't need Google glasses, I need Monet glasses. I might not mind the ever-increasing blur if it looked like this.

Instead my world is becoming blurrily nondescript.

Imperfect eyesight is especially frustrating to those who want the details, the contents, the ingredients. What's in that? How much can I take? Is it 4:00 or 4:08? Are those specs of coffee grounds on my kitchen counter or are they ants? Are they moving or is it just that I haven't had enough coffee?

So now I'm equipped with a giant magnifying glass and I'm not afraid to use it.

In addition to my magnifier, I have glasses in my purse, on my head, by my bed, by every computer and in my bathroom. Yes. Even there. I'm stashing them around the house like acorns for winter.

But Juliette, whose blur is much worse than mine, seems almost fine with it at times. She has, I suspect, been living with some level of blur most of her life, and despite a few "Aha" moments when she realized that leaves and bricks and sidewalk pavements all come in multiples and not just one long mosaic, she seems to be okay with some haze in her surroundings.

That, or she just doesn't want to be "the girl who wears glasses."

As a witness for the girl-glasses theory, I have to reveal that a month ago she called me from school in the middle of the day to tell me that she simply couldn't read the smartboard anymore, especially when the teacher writes in red pen, and she always writes in red pen and Something Must Be Done. You have to listen to Juliette when she speaks with capital letters, and I managed to get her an appointment that very day.

The optometrist looked at the test results with a puzzled face, something I dislike intensely. I want to know. I want you, the expert, to know. I want you to know that I know. I want you to know, that I want you to know. Oh, wait, I've gone all Kill Bill again.

Anyway, Puzzled Optometrist did several more tests and proclaimed what seemed to me impossible: her eyes had gone from slightly farsighted with an astigmatism, to mostly nearsighted with an astigmatism; her glasses are worthless, no wonder she has headaches.

And how can that be? Well, she grew. She's grown over a half inch in the past six months and as her legs were growing longer her eyeballs were growing bigger. And bigger in this case, while normal, did not ultimately result in better.

Should I be worried? She doesn't have a brain tumor or anything, right?

No, said Increasingly Less Puzzled Optometrist. This is unusual but not unheard of (cue mental note: get second opinion).

We measured her for new lenses, handed over the old glasses, since the lenses were worthless and the frames were still the only ones she liked, and prepared for a long week without glasses. Oh, and did I mention this is not covered by insurance because they only cover lenses once a year, which, until today, seemed totally reasonable? Yep.

Every day she asked me when they would be ready.

Soon, I said, soon. They put a rush on it..

"Today?"

Not yet.

Then finally, "today?"

Yes. We'll get them after school.

We go to Totally Back to Normal Optometrist and she puts the new glasses on. They help instantly. They're biofical transition lenses and that will take some getting used to, but the world is crisp and clear she says "Look, I see leaves!"

The doctor checks the glasses and says something I thought was so obvious I was oblivious and unprepared for the impact of his words "From now on, you'll need to wear those glasses all of the time."

Cue: tears.

I had a total Scooby Doo moment. I mean, if she can't see without them, and not wearing glasses gives her headaches, and school is hard when you can't see the board, and your teacher always writes in red pen etc. wouldn't wearing glasses all the time be a good thing?

Apparently not.

Because that would transform her from the Girl Who Wears Glasses in Class, but doesn't need them outside at recess, to the Girl Who Wears Glasses All of the Time. And this was a problem.

Fast forward through a week of "Where are your glasses? Did you wear your glasses in class? Put your glasses on. What? How could you leave your glasses at home? Do you want to get headaches again? You have a headache right now?" Do you even recognize this nagging creature dressed in your mother's clothes? Of course not, you can barely see her. And PS, I don't recognize her either. "Put your glasses on. Now."

She rebelled. She complained about cleaning them. She asked for contacts. She "forgot" them. She hated them. She cried a lot. For a week.

But at some point she gave in. Whether to visual clarity or threats from her parents, it's a little too early to say. But her homework gets done faster and the feedback from the teachers is good.

To her credit she is doing a good job of keeping track of the slightly less-hated-than-before glasses. If she wanted to, she could lose them, and force her mother to pay another out-of-pocket $600. Instead she's keeping them on her nose where they belong and it's understood that we only talk about them when she wants to talk about them, which is almost never.